Improving my SEO proposals

Hello there,

Over the last several months, things have been fruitful in terms of work and sales.

So much so, I almost forget that the start of November marked 1 year since I left my full time job to freelance.

It’s still so surreal.

Today, I want to talk through something I’ve been exposed to more in the last several months than in my whole SEO career:

Building out proposals for SEO prospects.

In this post I will walk through what are SEO proposals, the 4-step process I use for them, and some tips that had helped me improve the quality of my SEO proposals and the number of deals I close.

Building out proposals for SEO prospects

But first, I think it’s important to note…

Getting work takes time

Something I’ve heard from several consultants was that work picks up long after you’ve started on your freelance journey.

Nick LeRoy, a prominent figure in the SEO freelance space, said things didn’t pick up until 1.5 years after he started.

I’ve only crossed the 1 year mark and have been antsy for new business since I started freelancing.

Over the last several months, however, I’ve been on several prospect calls for Salesforce Commerce Cloud SEO projects, migration projects, and general consulting.

Granted, I have only closed 2 engagements, moved to varying stages of “sales” maturity for others, and am still in the initial stages on other opportunities.

I’m hoping this is a good sign for SEO work going into 2023.

Building proposals is a new arena for me.

During my time with a company, I leaned on account managers, project managers, and directors to help me craft contracts, SOWs, MSAs, proposals, follow-ups, etc.

When a brand wants to work together, the expectation is different.

I have to craft the paperwork and we all have to be in alignment.

Before I even get to contractual documentation, I have to win the prospect teams over with a proposal.
But… What do I mean by proposal?

What is an SEO proposal?

An SEO proposal is a document that summarizes how you can support the SEO initiatives of a new prospect, and how you can alleviate their pain points.

Its objective is to convince prospects that you are the best option for them. After all, they may be evaluating different consultants or agencies. 

It should speak to the value you bring to a prospect when they work with you.

An SEO proposal process has 5 important stages:

• Discovery Call
• Proposal Prep
• Summary and pricing slide
• Success cases and forecasts
• Proposal Review

Let’s review each one of them.

How to write an efficient SEO proposal? A 4-step process

1. Start with a “discovery” call

When a prospect reaches out, which is typically through my site or LinkedIn, I ask them to look for a time that works for them using Hubspot’s Meeting Scheduler.

I have set times in the tool where I’m open for calls – this is critical given my work dynamic (outlined initially here).

I’ve synced my Google Calendar so that timeslots where I’m not available are blocked out automatically in Hubspot.

A discovery call is an opportunity to get to know the prospect a bit better and understand their needs.

How does a typical discovery call go?

High level it looks like this:

• Prospect intro
• Personal intro
• Determination

1.1 Prospect intro

I ask the prospect to tell me about themselves and their brand, including:

• Their needs and painpoints: why are they looking for SEO services.
• Company and marketing goals: how SEO fits in their overall strategy.
• Website history: how it’s been performing? Has any SEO work been done before? If so, what was done?

This also extends to their team dynamic and how SEO has been perceived in the organization.

I ask the prospect to tell me about their audience, specifically personas. I began noticing that some brands have splintered audiences that can impact organic campaigns. Remember, SEO is largely based on reaching the right audience with the right content. It’s important to understand the audience at the onset.

Throughout the entire debrief, I take scrupulous notes on Notepad++, an HTML editor. I can’t tell you how important it is to take notes; it’s going to play a massive role, if and when, you want to move forward.

Side note: there are different note-taking apps out there but Notepad++ is my favorite because of how basic it is and how it helps me with fast note-taking. I disable any auto-correct / suggestion features – I feel for fast note taking, I’d rather misspell a word and correct it later than focus on spelling correctly and missing important pieces of dialogue.

1.2 My intro

From there, I move on to my introduction; you may think introducing myself last is a bit backwards but it’s for good reason.

First, allowing the prospect to introduce themselves, allows me to assess their needs and whether I’d be a good fit.

What’s more, holding off on my introduction for last allows me to pivot my conversation to what the prospect is looking for.

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For example, when a client tells me that they’re looking for technical support, I can pivot my introduction to speak to my technical SEO skillsets.

If I were to introduce myself first, the opportunity to speak to those skills would lessen or would require me to backtrack; not something I want to do during a discovery call.

1.3 Determination

After both the prospect and I have had a chance to get to know one another, it comes down to determining whether we should proceed with a proposal.

Every conversation doesn’t have to end with, “Well, I’ll put together a proposal”.

Example:

I was talking to an e-commerce brand that saw massive growth in the last 5 years and wanted to take the next step in organic search.

The founder wasn’t sure where to go.

Based on the conversation, they weren’t looking for a consultant to supplement their team; they were looking for a full-time resource to build the team.

Which is not bad, but based on their needs and mine, I didn’t feel it was a good fit.

I advised them to look for a resource that can wholly own that discipline.

We didn’t move forward with a proposal.

Conversely, I was talked to another prospect that requested technical support for their international Salesforce Commerce Cloud sites – as you may know, this is a niche of mine, so I was very eager to move forward.

I let them know that over the next week I’d pull together a proposal based on our conversation.

This was enough of a runway to tend to my prior commitments but also mull over a unique service offering.

I requested that we set a time and day to review (more on reviewing a proposal together, later).

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2. Prepping the SEO proposal. 5 things you must include

Once I’ve agreed to move forward with building a proposal I do several things at once. Usually it looks like this: 

• Review your notes
• Do preliminary research
• Outline the challenge and opportunity
• Highlight your value-add
• Create a loose timeline

But before I continue,  I need to stress none of this would actually have been possible without the input and support from Jason Wilson, another SEOer in the space.

He and I were chatting one day and I told him about my approach and Jason was extraordinarily kind enough to share tips on how to craft a more effective proposal; several of which I highlight below.

Jason, if you’re reading this, thanks again, bud.

2.1 Review your notes

I review my notes to remind myself of what the prospect was looking for, what their concerns were, and anything that would make a proposal a success.

Anyone can offer a generic proposal but if you really want to close, you need to tailor the approach.

This is why note-taking is so critical:

Your thrust back to the conversation and are able to pinpoint what truly matters to the client.

2.2 Preliminary research

Research, for me, is a must, even if it’s high level.

You’re not required to fully understand their infrastructure and every nuance for the proposal but it helps to review performance trends, high level gaps, their current CMS, etc.

The goal is to understand what you’re up against, as a means to craft an accurate proposal but it’s also meant to reassure you and, the prospect, why you’d be a great partner.

The purpose of this part is to understand where your strengths can supplement their needs.

Often, I’ve seen consultants provided a blanketed proposal without any thought or additional research.

This only hurts the dialogue.

The prospects I’ve talked to appreciate the thought that I’ve given to a tailored proposal based on their needs.

2.3 Outline the challenge and opportunity

This here was inspired by Jason.

Stating the challenge and opportunity that a prospect faces was so simple but effective.

Stating a challenge level sets what the prospect is up against and reassures them that you understand their needs and that the proposal is tailored for them.

The opportunity is what your prospect gains by working with you to overcome their challenge.

For example, for the prospect that had international issues:

The challenge was tied to international SEO and a faulty hreflang tag setup.

The opportunity was improving their user experience for international markets through a correct hreflang tag structure, specific to their CMS.

2.4 Highlight your value-add

There are no shortages of SEOers in the space.

What makes you so special?

Well, now is your time for a humble-brag.

Speak to your strengths and how you add value in light of the challenges the prospect is looking to resolve.

Let’s say your prospect is on a specific platform or relies on a specific technology, one that your are familiar with – you can highlight how you are familiar with said platform or technology.

Or, let’s say that your prospect has an issue you’ve had experience in, talk through that experience.

Again, my prospect had hreflang issues on Salesforce Commerce Cloud.

Lucky for them, I had experience with the platform a platform, as well as communicating the issue to dev team members via an SEO dev ticket. As such, I highlighted my level of familiarity.

This re-assures them that I understand the complexity and how to resolve – i.e. the value I can bring to their challenge.

2.5 Create a loose timeline

An area that’s been extraordinarily helpful is creating a loose timeline of events if the prospect and I were to engage.

This would convey the time needed to realize major milestones and deliverables.

A timeline reassures a prospect that you’ve thought through their situation and their SEO priorities to determine a level of effort that may be required.

It doesn’t need to be super specific, just showing the general things you want to achieve month by month or week by week is sufficient. For example:

A tool like Online Gantt Can be pretty useful for that purpose.

A timeline has also helped me balance my bandwidth:

I didn’t want to sign up for too much work and creating a timeline allows me to level set expectations based on the work I’ve already committed to.

This is not to be confused with an SEO project plan; rather this timeline is based on the current needs of the prospect.

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3. Building a summary + pricing slide

I group a summary of services (called out in the timeline section above) with pricing; it’s a great opportunity to summarize what you’re proposing, including the services and deliverables that you’re selling based on the needs of the prospect.

This view lays it all on the table.

The services your proposing are going to impact pricing.

That said, pricing is going to vary based on the needs of your prospect as well as what value you bring to an engagement.

Here’s an example of that slide could look like: 

I think it’s significant to note that pricing for an engagement directly with a brand is typically much higher than pricing for a contracting role where you work with an agency.

This has been my goal since beginning to freelance – land dedicated clients while realizing income via contracting roles.

But anyway, let’s see how you actually determine the price for your services.

3.1 Determining a price for your SEO services

So what does pricing look like for a project?

For me, it feels something like this:

(Hourly Rate) x (Total Hours needed for project)

Now, granted, I don’t share the hourly rate with prospects (more on this in a sec); this can be a disservice because it gives the impression you can be hired on an as needed basis.

The goal is steady income through retainer based engagements (engagements that are a fixed fee every month).

If a retainer won’t suit the brand, it’s ok, I can pull together a quote that matches their project needs.

Based on the amount determined above, I can quote a specific project and provide the total dollar amount.

However, you should be prepared to speak to what went into the quote based on the services and deliverables you will provide.

What’s a good hourly rate for you? Again, that’ll vary based on the client, your experience, the work, and your expenses.

I will say this, though, I started quoting projects at a much lower rate (greater than $100) but have gotten comfortable increasing the ceiling with more and more prospects. It’s been received well.

My advice – play with your ideal rate. Keep increasing but match with what you feel you’re worth.

What happens if the client wants a discount or wants to enter in negotiations?

That’ll depend on how secure you feel about your quote.

My piece of advice when dealing with prospects on a budget, focus on cutting back services to meet their needs but do not discount your work.

This was solid advice I received from Mark Williams-Cook. He advised that, “if budget is the problem” something can be worked work out by doing less but your rate shouldn’t change.

3.2 Leaning on tiered pricing

A great way to improve the appeal of an engagement is through a tiered pricing approach – another great recommendation from Jason.

In this case, Jason recommended having a Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 set of services, all of which come with a set of services and deliverables.

This would then allow a prospect to be open to working with you based on their budget.

In my case, I used the tiered approach for pricing audits but, because it was on a platform I’m familiar with, I also offered pricing on the actual implementation. This has the benefit of me being in the driver seat and alleviating my prospect’s from added responsibilities.

4. Include success stories and forecasts

The poet Edgar Guest once said:

“Fine counsel is confusing, but example is always clear”.

The same is true for an SEO proposal.

Your presentation will be much more valuable if you include a forecast showing the impact of the proposed SEO actions.

Another great option is to include examples of past projects, which clearly show the impact your services have had on a business. Whether it’s traffic graphs from Google Analytics or improved keyword rankings in ahrefs, this will clearly show the value you bring to the table.

5. Reviewing a proposal together

When I began pulling proposals together, I would email what I was proposing to the prospect.

The close rate was not great but I thought “Well, this is sales”.

Again, I talked to Jason and he recommended “Never send a proposal. Always get on to go over it with them on a call.”

I took his advice and it made sense right away.

Once on a call with the prospect, I have the opportunity to walk them through my thoughts and ideas, answer any lingering questions, and speak to why I felt what I proposed was critical, including the responsibilities and pricing.

This was a game changer.

Often, there were so many questions and comments a prospect had and a call would afford us the opportunity to talk through them.

Additionally, during a call, I would continue to scope out the personality of the brand, their resources, urgency, and needs.

What happens after the proposal review

What happens after a call reviewing your proposal?

For me, it’s pretty straight forward.

I email a PDF of the proposal; if there were any questions I couldn’t answer on the call, I’d include responses to them as well but the review typically suffices.

I encourage the prospect to follow-up with any questions and provide them space to think through what I’ve proposed.

From there, I give the prospect some room to digest (sometimes a week, sometimes sooner depending on their urgency).

If they’re interested, then I move forward with building a scope of work (SOW) that outlines our engagement.

Now, I won’t go into the details of an SOW, service agreement, etc. as I’m still learning how to navigate this realm, but Nick LeRoy and Kristine Schachinger had a great conversation on The SEO Freelancer Podcast and I encourage you to definitely take a listen.

Summary

I understand a ton goes into the sales process and a proposal is just one facet; one where different consultants manage in different forms.

I’ll be honest, I’m still learning.

I’m trying to better round myself out in the sales process, finding my own groove, and seeing it to fruition.

There is no silver bullet.

I think I’m a very knowledgeable SEOer but this is sales. It requires a completely different skillset, one I’m still honing in on.

If you have any questions on the above or suggestions on how to improve the proposal process, I would love to hear it!

All the best!